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Yup, It’s true! If you’re looking for hockey, baseball, football, soccer, or any other jerseys, Michigan Shirt Works has the know how to print your custom jerseys! What kind of know how? Well, printing jerseys requires an understanding on how particular formulations of inks react to heat when on different materials, and this really matters when screen printing custom jerseys.

When printing on jerseys, often time the material that the jersey is made of is comprised of 100% polyester, or a combination of polyester, rayon, nylon, or a host of other synthetic fibers. Why does this matter? It comes down to how the jersey material reacts when exposed to heat during the ink curing process. When dealing with an organic fiber, such as cotton, the organic fiber of cotton absorbs and holds the colored dye of the shirt much better than synthetic fibers. Because of this, the mills who dye the synthetic fabric have to overdye the fabric, so that the synthetic fabric has the vibrant colors they want. This becomes important when you want to cure the jersey in the oven. What happens when you expose a synthetic fiber to heat? The dye wants to migrate into the wet ink that is printed on the jersey. That means that if you’re printing white ink on a red jersey, and don’t make the proper temperature and ink formulation adjustments, you can end up with pink ink on a red jersey!

It takes an understanding of these different ink formulations and how to use them properly in conjunction with the correct curing temperatures depending on the jersey fabric that you’re printing on. You can depend on the printing experience of Michigan Shirt Works to print your jerseys properly so that they look their best and last long beyond the season ends.

Without the right ink formulation and proper heat settings, that ink would look violet, not the bright white as originally intended!